Month: January 2010

Wow, 2009 really flew by! Now that we’ve closed out an amazingly successful year I thought I would show off one of my favorite weddings from the latter part of this year. Looking back I see that we achieved our goal of an even mix of wedding, portrait and event/commercial work! I love the diversity because it allows me to try so many different techniques that eventually apply to other areas of my photography work. For example, I’ve done a lot of food and product photography which gave me new insight to shooting a wedding cake and small details such as rings. Portrait lighting gave me ideas on how to shoot events with a 2nd or even 3rd light on a stand which makes an ordinary shot of people networking really “pop.”

Here are Mike and Andrea Laborin, photographed at Nardini Manor. I met them over a year ago at the bridal expo and I was amazed at how meticulous they were in planning their wedding down to the last detail!

First, the late afternoon sun was pouring through this frosted window where the girls were getting ready; the light was gorgeous and allowed me to create a dreamy look to some of these images.

The outdoor garden was another breathtaking spot for their formal portraits.

The ceremony took place in another garden area with an amazing elevated gazebo.

Chris Burkett from Birkett Entertainment was the DJ and it was a blast working with him again. He has a unique talent for getting the bridal party involved in entertaining the crowd during a Grease-themed skit and it was a hit! He also had a cool lighting effect which created a starry sky on the white tent ceiling. I use a special multiple-flash/exposure technique to get this “first dance” shot to work. You can’t just set the camera to “auto” and expect everything to come together (that is a common “newbie” mistake now that everyone has a camera and calls themselves a photographer.) In fact, many of these shots benefit from the multi-light setup; it is a little more effort but the results are worth it. It also works well with my double exposures.

Finally, this combination of b/w and color tends to get overdone so I don’t use it very often BUT loved the idea of the guys drinking their Dos Equis and having a toast.